The Last Word

Issue #525
™

July 2018

How cool people roadtrip in Vincennes

By...bipping! That’s how.
On Memorial Day weekend—Saturday and Sunday—
our coolster caravan scooted over to southwestern Indiana,
because. This was a long Scholaring that also counts as a mish.
We traveled light.
Sadly, however, nobody peed on any gas station floors,
nor were any celebrity look-alikes or bunker blasts detected. A
pity indeed. Then again, I had very short notice, so I didn’t
know where to look for such hilarity.
However, compared to other automotive roadtrips in
recent years, this one was leaner, meaner, greener! We didn’t try
to visit every county that had 12 people, nor did we patronize
any luxury restaurants in a hopeless effort to impress their rich
customers (not like I ever have before). A proud, confident teeth
punker am I.

Stoned again...a tonsil stone, that is!

If you ever pry out a tonsil stone, you won’t know
whether to flush it down the toilet or keep it forever because it
was a part of you! It’s not some alien accessory that someone
foisted upon you. Maybe you can make jewelry out of it.
On April 26, 1999, I unambiguously experienced a kidney stone. (It was the same day as an Ally McBeal
episode in which Rosie O’Donnell bubbled.) The hospital had me pee it into a strainer, and I noted in these pages
that it resembled a bacon bit on the salad bar at Frisch’s Big Boy. But the hosp didn’t let me keep this beaut,
because they wanted to analyze it. I’ve yet to receive the results.
On a recent Sunday—June 10—a different kind of stone was discovered. I was plagued that day by the
feeling of a small object lodged in my throat—accompanied by a sour taste. Beegee could have alleviated the
rancid taste, but I’d still have to combat the discomfort.
What was causing this ordeal? The Internet revealed that it was most likely a tonsil stone. But how do we
stop this crap from hap? I gargled with Pepsi. That didn’t dislodge the stone. What was a mere mortal to do?
Stink?
As I settled in for an action-packed 1985 installment of American Top 40, the stone was causing me to
gag. To fight this menace, I stuck my finger deep into my mouth, probed for the stone, and deftly pried it free. It
flew onto the floor of my office as Casey Kasem introduced the Power Station at #27.
The Interpipes reports that tonsil stones are made of food particles, boogers, and other useful things—all
rolled together into one convenient amulet. Best all, they stink. It was smaller than a pea, and it was stinking up
the whole room. It actually looked somewhat like the kidney stone...
 I wanted to keep it, but—because I read on the Internet that tonsil stones release an even stronger sulfur
smell if you break them apart—I broke it up instead. Sadly, however, no more odor was forthcoming.
Tonsil stones usually travel in packs. A couple weeks later, I extracted another with my toothbrush. It
stunk up the bathroom when I broke it apart.
Tonsil stones for the win!

Psychiatry protects dominionism

Many of us slog under the misconception that the checkbook clergy and its followers only care about
right-wing social issues—not economics. But even years before Facebook, they proved their populism was phony.
The dominionist agenda governs not just the bedroom but also subjects like taxation, labor, and welfare—and it
favors the rich. According to their propaganda, if you are rich, you must have been good.
Many folks have a similar misconception that right-wing media figures, editorial boards, and
professionals only care about economics and not social issues. Again, nothing can be further from the truth. For
every CEO or big company that supports socially conservative causes, how many are there that support liberal
positions?
The psychiatric racket even protects and coddles the social and economic right-wing extremism that
defines dominionism. The American Psychiatric Association’s
Diagnostic And Statistical Manual Of Mental Disorders has defined
delusional disorders as consisting of beliefs that are not “culturally
accepted.” In other words, a delusion is considered normal as long
as enough people believe it. It doesn’t have to be anywhere near a
majority. It just has to be relatively common among those who
stage-manage what we’re allowed to think.
For example, the laughable belief that America has record-
low unemployment is a delusion. But you won’t be diagnosed with a
delusional disorder for believing it, because there are enough people
in the pop-up media who seem to believe it. Denying climate change
is also a delusion. But—even though a vast majority know that
climate change is real and caused by human activity—enough
people deny it that climate change denial won’t get you
institutionalized for a delusional disorder.
Conversely, many factual ideas might be sufficient to get
one diagnosed with a delusional disorder. Needless to say, however,
don’t start thinking that the psychiatric industry’s broad definition of
delusional disorders—which excludes right-wing delusions—will let
you collect Social Security Disability. You will always be
considered disabled enough to be forcibly “treated” but never
disabled enough to get benefits for it. Count on it. That’s as certain
as death and taxes. Some right-wing nobody recently wrote an article demanding that Social Security tighten the
mental health eligibility requirements—even as the diagnostic criteria for forced “treatment” grow wider, except
of course for right-wingers. In fact, the government has already tightened requirements (again) so that disability
applicants are 30% less likely to win their appeal than in 2008.
The biggest problem with a superiority complex like this is that only inferior minds have it.
I know this sounds like another problem we can’t just bubble away, but maybe the “pucker up and blow”
guy on the news was right. Studying this issue is soul-sucking, and it wears on you. It’s like beating on a locked
metal door. At least gum is cheap.

A Roads Scholar fed gum thief sullied Super Bubble

For years, one of my goals in life was to get a certain other road transport enthusiast from Kentucky to
mention bubble gum. It can’t just be gum. It has to specifically be bubble gum. I already got him to mention
Sesame Street at least a couple times—like when he said he watched the series premiere even though he was too
old for it, because someone had led him to believe the show would be full of his favorite comic book characters.
This man has been known for his increasingly conservative political views that have made him a pariah
among other Roads Scholars. But recently he admitted in an Internet posting that he once gummed—using a
bubble bustin’ brand of beegee, no less. He finally used the magic phrase—bubble gum. And I didn’t even have to
prompt him for it! The subject came up in a message thread about cool ways to get revenge on evildoers.
He says that when he was in middle school, he hoarded Super Bubble in his locker, for he enjoyed
chomping it. Probably even bubbled, though I hear from a reliable source that the bubbleability of this brand has
declined precipitously in recent decades, and the bubbles no longer even get big enough to burst and stick to your
face like they should. Oddly enough, some dentists have begun including Super Bubble in the goodie bags they
give to patients. This is also the brand George W. Bush chewed whenever he locked
himself in his office and threw his reading glasses.
Anybip, someone kept breaking into our Kentucky roadfan’s locker and stealing
his prized bubble gum. So our Kentucky roadfan came up with an idea. He unwrapped
several pieces of gum from his stockpile, somehow hollowed them out, and filled them
with cayenne pepper, black pepper, and other additives that don’t belong in bubble gum.
Then he wrapped them back up and put them back in his locker.
Predictably, these tainted pieces of bubble gum got stolen too. But whoever was
stealing the gum never stole it again once they bit into a slab and found it was full of
pepper.

I watched ‘Roseanne’ because Becky farted

My teenage years are in tatters now that so many sitcom stars from that era have been disgraced. Bill
Cosby has been convicted of indecent assault, Kirk Cameron has become a right-wing religious fanatic, and Lisa
Whelchel has endorsed child abuse. I didn’t regularly watch the sitcoms that each of these actors starred in at the
time, because I bubbled instead. Wait, I didn’t bubble either. Unless I did. I didn’t keep a bubble log, so I don’t
know. I watched the Cosby Show episode where Vanessa got drunk, but that’s about it.
In the latest sitcom scandal, as you may know, Roseanne Barr made a racist comment on Twitter. I
wouldn’t even call the remark a joke, because it lacked a necessary element called humor. The “shit stinks”
sayings on the People’s Forum were jokes, because they were funny. Roseanne’s comment wasn’t. It’s her own
fault she lost her show because of it.
I wasn’t a regular viewer of the original Roseanne—but I made a special effort to watch one particular
episode in 1989. That’s because I heard that in this episode, the character Becky was going to pass gas at school.
You see, people ripping bunker blasts at school was a topic I was familiar with, because this was in the Brossart
era. But what’s funnier than passing gas? Passing gas on TV!
Becky’s backdoor breeze itself didn’t appear in the show. But her loud-and-proud air biscuit was central
to the plot of this Roseanne installment, and it was discussed extensively. After all, why wouldn’t it be? When
someone cracks a wafto, it should be the #1 topic of discussion until the next trouser sneeze.
But that was the old Roseanne. Because of recent events, the show’s once-honorable legacy is now in
ruins. TV stations used to fight over getting an ABC affiliation just so they could show Roseanne. Not anymore.
Meanwhile, a white supremacist page on alt-right website Facebook has been spreading a meme
complaining that Roseanne has been canceled while The Cosby Show has not. Uh, when was the last time The
Cosby Show has had any new episodes, geniuses?

I watched ‘Hooperman’ because John Ritter stuck his head in the

toilet
Hooperman was a short-lived “dramedy” in the late ‘80s starring the late John Ritter as the title character,
a police inspector. Despite the name, it had nothing to do with Mr. Hooper, the friendly storekeeper on Sesame
Street.
 In an era when I didn’t watch much prime-time TV—remember, this was also when Brossart gave me 3
hours of homework each night—I looked fiveward to one particular Hooperman episode. I had heard that this
episode would include Ritter dunking his head
in the toilet. My ears perked up when I heard
that.
Finally, the day came. “John Ritter’s
gonna stick his head in the toilet tonight,” I was
assured—as if I didn’t already know, because
I’d waited a week and probably marked my
calendar for it. I had to walk on eggshells for a
week to be allowed to watch it—which was
damn near impossible at Brossart. As
Hooperman’s time slot approached, we all
gathered around the TV in the living room. The
show started with ol’ John in the shower with
his head covered with shampoo suds—as the
faucet broke.
Here it comes! He’s gonna do it!
John stepped out of the shower and
approached the donicker. He leaned over and...
Wow. What a letdown.
I thought he was going to put his head
in the toilet bowl. Instead, he put it in the toilet
tank. This wasn’t one-zillionth as funny as if he
had stuck his head in the bowl, because the
bowl is where all the pee and poo goes.
I don’t know if I was as disappointed as
the man who complained because Arnold
Schwarzenegger’s gubernatorial announcement
caused his bubble gum blowing contest to be
canceled. I think that guy was inconsolable.
With the bottomless abuse at Brossart, I
didn’t have much time for TV, so the TV that I
watched had better be good. Now that I have a
social worker, now I understand that fighting
Brossart’s abuse also took every last shred of energy out of me. Once during the Brossart era, a relative mailed me
a book that looked interesting, but I never got very far at reading it, because I had so little energy that I couldn’t
stay alert long enough to read any more of it. Almost every waking moment was spent dealing with Brossart. You
never catch up.
In the meantime, the other side partied (while accusing everyone else of partying and not working).

Freedent: why does it exist?

Freedent’s the one! Yes, it’s the one brand of gum nobody chews.
You already know Freedent has been produced by Wrigley’s for over 40 years and that its selling point is
that it isn’t supposed to stick to dental work. You already know we poked fun at Freedent because hardly anyone
buys it. Oh, there are a few spoilsports out there in cyberspace talking about how they got some Freedent because
it’s not supposed to stick. But they’re not cool people like you and me.
Gum should stick. That’s part of the fun! Would you enjoy gum so much if it just slid off of everything
like it was greased with fresh dog shit?
Freedent gathers so much dust on store shelves that I can’t believe it’s actually profitable. I understand not
everything has to be profitable. If I only did what was profitable, society would be deprived of this fine
publication. But Wrigley’s is a business. Businesses, sadly, are supposed to Make Money.
So I think I figured out why Freedent is produced and is so widely available even though nobody likes it.
I think it’s a tax write-off. Sometimes you’ll read about a musician or band making a bad record just so they could
get out of a recording contract. I think Freedent is sort of like that. I think Wrigley’s makes an unprofitable gum
just to lighten their tax burden.
 I’m not saying Wrigley’s is doing anything illegal. If you could
legally pay less in taxes, wouldn’t you? If Matt Bevin gets his 8% sales
tax on food, I plan on doing my grocery shopping in Ohio instead. That
wouldn’t be against the law (though the tax itself probably would be).
Tax evasion is illegal, but tax avoidance isn’t, since it means using legal
methods to pay less taxes. Wikipedia even makes the distinction on
legality.
On the other hand, is it ethical? For me to buy food in Ohio
would be, because buying it in Kentucky would only redistribute my
hard-earned money to the rich without getting anything more in return.
But a corporation has an ethical duty to pay all taxes—not find a way
out just so its execs can feel good about themselves.

‘Fat Albert’ talked about heavy shit

“Hey hey hey!”
Long before Bill Cosby became one of the latest celebrities to
experience a stunning downfall, one of his most famous endeavors was
Fat Albert—the animated series of the 1970s and 1980s.
Fat Albert always included a lesson, as Cosby would narrate the
show in brief live-action segments in which he was usually seen painting
items in a garage. Many folks think of Fat Albert as being designed for
very young children, because of its Saturday morning time slot among
other cartoons. But as the series evolved, its subject matter became more
sophisticated.
In 1979, one of the cartoon’s characters even beat off to porn...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCPrHyXf8aQ

Here’s a synopsis of the second half of that episode in case you’re afraid it includes the commercials and
the Flavor Fiend from the Bubble Yum ads will jump out of the screen and steal your gum. In that installment, Fat
Albert’s pals are introduced to pornography, and they think it’s the greatest invention ever. They grab some
pornographic magazines and smuggle them home.
Later, we see the character Rudy taking his magazine into his bedroom and shutting the door behind him.
He lays down on his bed and admires the centerfold. Then we see his alarm clock advancing a few hours, and he
falls asleep.
Yep, he basted his turkey. He pulled his joystick. He polished his trophy. He pulled out his fiddle and
rosined up his bow.
Rudy from Fat Albert masturbated to a porn mag! There’s absolutely no doubt whatsoever that’s what he
did. Watch that scene and see for yourself!
The funniest part is when his mom opens the door and finds him.
One of the most terrifying Fat Albert scenes aired in 1984...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_eO98ynJTU

In that episode, the cop with the drill sergeant voice takes Albert and his friends to visit a prison. When I
found this on YouTube, I was afraid I’d have nightmares about the prisoners. Some of them were among the most
horrifying, dangerous, sinister characters ever to appear in a cartoon. The inmates describing prison life might as
well be talking about capitalism.
Some prisoners threatened to rape the cast of Fat Albert.
That was actually an edited version of that scene. Evidently, the original version included stronger
language and aired precisely once. The original has never appeared in any DVD collection, and it’s believed that
no copies of it even still exist.
Fat Albert still had some influence when I was in college. During my WRFN days, some of the other DJ’s
used to run out in the hall and yell, “Hey hey hey!” This created such a hilarious disturbance in the otherwise calm
hallway that the university threatened to ban them from the station.
People fought over Bubble Tape and wasted it
Ever want something so badly that you end up accidentally destroying it when you finally acquire it?
It’s like the episode of The Simpsons where Bart and his buddies fight over a rare comic book. Or the kid
who was so excited to get a Stretch Armstrong for Christmas that he stretched it too far the day he got it.
It can be the same way with bubble gum. Everybody wants to bust beegee. Some people just snatch the
stuff right up because nobody will object. But some sneak around in their attempts to procure it, perhaps because
their parents or their dentist frown upon it—which makes it even more
valuable.
But someone out there on the big mean Internet says that the zeal
to acquire bubble gum went awry when they were in 3 rd grade. This
person’s classmates were bubble gum poppin’ people, and they all wanted
to bubble in the worst way.
So this person smuggled a canister of Bubble Tape into recess at
school. The person discovered their schoolmates were eager to trade an
entire week’s worth of snacks for just a couple inches of Bubble Tape.
Inevitably, however, the beegee was so highly coveted that the kids fought
over it. They all wanted to break off the longest strand, and they weren’t
letting it go without a fight.
In a fit of unchecked gluttony, one of the kids on the playground
opened the canister instead of tearing off a piece in a dignified manner.
This fighting over the Bubble Tape caused the entire roll to tumble out of
the container and onto the pavement in one piece—thereby wosting it.
All that gum, wastage bastage!
Wyyyyystage byyyyystage! It was wyyyyystage byyyyystage!
Meanwhile, some woman—also on the Internet—got mad at her
parents because they fed her 6-year-old son Hubba Bubba, which enticed
him to bubble, nearly dislodging his dental work. Live a little, will ya?

A person got mad because their ‘Sesame Street Treasury’ wasn’t

treasured
In last month’s ish, I regaled you with the story of The Sesame Street Library. Someone ordered this 15-
volume set of books from an Amazon outside seller but received only 12 books—which were in tatters.
A few years after this series was released, the Sesame Street demolition derby came back for more (as
Ratt would say)! That was when another 15-volume effort was released—this one titled The Sesame Street
Treasury.
For a long time, I’d associated the word treasury with Sesame Street, and now I remember why. Although
I’d outgrown the ol’ Ses when this set hit stores, I think my mom once showed me this series in a bookstore
thinking I’d be interested. It was like the time she got a book at a yard sale that I was too old for.
This set reportedly consisted of material from The Sesame Street Library and a few other works that the
show put out, such as a cookbook and a book on sign language. By calling it a treasury, you feel even more guilty
when copies of it get ruined. The very word highlights how each volume is supposed to be treasured forever.
But some people have something wrong with themselves, and they didn’t treasure The Sesame Street
Treasury. There’s some sick people out there.
Someone tried to order this series from an Amazon seller, but she reported receiving only one volume.
“And it was moldy,” she wrote in the review. Moldy??? What sort of debased weirdo allowed a prized Sesame
Street book—one that’s part of a treasury, no less—to become moldy? And what did they do with the other 14
volumes? Bubble with them? Nope, because it’s not gum.
The destroyment of this set of books might not have been carried out by anyone who rightfully owned it,
but perhaps a family member who mishandled the volumes. I can just imagine what happened. The books
probably belonged to a child who eventually outgrew them but didn’t want to discard them, because they were
still in good shape and could enlighten future generations. When this person went off to college and moved out,
their parents probably put the books in a stack of items to be thrown out. The person probably saw this and went
ballistic about the idea of the books being thrown away, and an argument ensued. Eventually, the parents agreed to
keep them, but they shoved them in a closet where the toilet leaked on them. Either that, or the parents nagged
them that they shouldn’t take their books with them to their new place because they might get stolen—and they
ended up getting stolen from the parents’ home anyway. But it’s unclear why the thieves left one volume behind.
Poo-poo got all over stuff in Louisville
It’s good to know the Courier-Journal still has content besides its idiotic “Matt Bevin for President”
campaign.
Recently, the office of Louisville’s police chief got flooded by raw sewage when inmates in the jail
upstairs overflowed the toilets.
The prisoners stuffed bedclothes, jail-issued jumpsuits, and other goodies into the tinkletoriums—thereby
clogging them. The wastewater flooding the chief’s office highlights the inadequacy of this aging jail—which is
used whenever the main jail becomes overcrowded because pretty much everything these days is illegal. Inmates
held at this jail are those with no history of disruptive behavior. A police spokesperson said there’s no way to
know if inmates who clogged the toilets actually intended to damage the chief’s office.
Plop!

A kid broke a statue and almost had to pay for it

Something got ru in Overland Park, Kansas.
That city has a community center where children often run
and play inside. One of the hallways also contained a very fragile
statue.
You can already see where this story is headed.
Recently, a 5-year-old boy was playing in that hall when he
saw the statue. He promptly bipped on over to it, wrapped his arm
around it, and pulled it plumb-bob down.
The statue fell to the floor with a smash. The boy’s mom
figured they’d have to pay for it, but sticker shock set in when the
city told them how much it would cost: $132,000.
The city went after the family with extreme gusto—
expecting them to pay every last penny. The family received a letter
accusing them of negligence. This despite the fact that it was the
city’s fault for putting a fragile statue in a hall where kids play.
A city spokesperson said the statue was on loan to the city.
“There’s a societal responsibility that you may not interact with it if
it’s not designed for interaction,” he insisted, even in the face of
evidence showing the city was wrong.
Eventually, the city decided not to go after the family after
all—and let the city’s insurer pay for the damage. (Moves face
towards reader.) That means justice prevailed. (Moves face away
from reader.)

Alt-right barbarism and betrayal

My long-running blog The Online Lunchpail is event-driven—focusing mostly on serious current news
events. The Last Word—at least when we still cover serious subjects—has become topic-driven. One of the most
serious matters of late is the Trump regime’s ghoulish and illegal policy of separating immigrant families, the
hypocrisy surrounding it, and the fake news that has fueled this hypocrisy.
America has been building up to such barbarism for decades—so, sadly, I’m not surprised by this policy. I
also feel a sense of betrayal.
There have been cases in the United States in recent years in which victims of home invasions have been
punished for defending themselves from intruders. In at least one case, hooligans broke into a home, the victim
killed them in self-defense, and the victim was charged and convicted of murder. Not just assault or even
manslaughter—but murder.
As a victim of repeated home invasions in 2009-10, if I’d caught the intruder, I would have done the exact
same thing the man in this case did. I would not have hesitated. Don’t break into homes if you don’t want this to
happen. It’s that simple.
I feel betrayed because authorities argued that defending yourself from violent intruders isn’t what we do
in a civilized society—while those who supported prosecuting the victim are the same people who now favor
Trump’s family separation policy.
 How can the alt-right whine that we should be nicer to violent criminals, while at the same time support
Trump’s barbaric immigration policy that terrorizes innocent children?
I’d been led by The Media to believe that the home invasion victim had lured the intruders to his home to
kill them. If that was true, he should have been charged. But investigating the case further, now I know that was
fake news. All that time, I was believing a lie—a lie spread by the pop-up media.
Few criminal defendants in modern America have been defended by the alt-right as much as George
Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch coordinator who killed an unarmed Trayvon Martin. They claimed the
castle doctrine gives a person the right to follow someone around in a public place to shoot them. Then why
wouldn’t it give a person the right to protect their own life at home during a home invasion?
The only conclusion is that the alt-right—including the Tea Party—is itself a program to promote crime.
Maybe they know they’re such losers that they’ll never be winners, so they retaliate against the world by shitting
on everything they touch. It highlights what I’ve known for 30 years, which is that you can’t trust the system. I’m
also reminded of the story of the narcotics detective in Louisville who accidentally left his McDonald’s receipt in
the box he stole money from. His error took down the entire drug task force, as it was found to be performing
illegal warrantless searches of drug suspects. Instead of doing cop-type things like fight crime, the detective did
thug-type things like steal money—and his unit was found to be breaking other laws.
Let’s all sweep it under the rug and pretend this makes us cool kids.

WellCare throws a little shitfit

Every time I go for the mailbox, I gotta hold myself down.
Each day, there’s always a chance I get mail from WellCare—and when I do, it’s usually bad news.
WellScare is an HMO that Kentucky requires people of normal means to use. As a general rule, socialism works
—except the parts that have been privatized. WellCare is a living example.
A few years ago, WellCare assigned me to a different main doctor without asking me. Their website that
ostensibly would have allowed me to change it back was broken. It was far worse than the Obamacare website,
which I never had trouble with (despite the lies by The Media to divert attention from the Tea Party’s government
shutdown). So I had to argue with WellCare on the phone repeatedly to get them to change it back. I also didn’t
appreciate WellCare’s telemarketing calls. They were worse than Spectrum.
Now I’ve received a letter stating that WellScare will no longer cover scheduled visits to any of the local
St. Elizabeth hospitals—even though St. E has a monopoly in northern Kentucky. The letter lists some hospitals
that they’ll still cover—but none that are close.
Why? Because
they’re 0ut 0f n3tw0rk lol.
I’m sure you’ve heard that
excuse from HMO’s and
insurers before. Well,
HMO’s don’t take the
Hippocratic Oath like
doctors do. So HMO death
panels shouldn’t get to
decide these things. If I
need life-saving treatment
at St. E, I’m going to St. E,
and if WellCare doesn’t
like it, they can always
flush themselves down the
toilet. Their greed be
damned.
Who died and
made WellCare the world’s
Allowed Cloud?
There’s one good
thing about WellCare’s
toddler tantrum though. The fact that the letter allows hospitals in Ohio—along with the fact that my main doctor
in 1995 was in Ohio—should kablammo the arrogant smirks off the oozing mugs of those who say you can’t visit
out-of-state doctors.
A few weeks after this letter, I got another letter from WellCare. This one said they were still going to
cover St. E visits after all. Evidently, the backlash was so great that WellScare backed down.
 Not so tough now, are ya, WellCare? They’re like the bully who finally gets their comeuppance and slinks
away humiliated.

Operation KroBread?
Kids in small towns love it, clowns love it, even friends with Charlie Brown love it. But not anymore.
You’re gonna have to pick your jaw up off the floor, because a big company actually got one right for a
change by denying responsibility for something. Instead, the blame rests with a different big company.
It’s much harder to find good bread than it used to be. I gave up buying bread at some stores, because it
always tasted like dishwashing liquid or bleach. So now I buy it at the friendly neighborhood Kroger. In recent
weeks, I’ve buyed Butternut white bread at Krogie-Wogie a couple times, and I’ve noticed that it’s smelled and
tasted like a mix of urine, mold, and a sweaty locker room. It was disgusting. I’d been buying this brand for a
while, and it wasn’t like this before.
After the second instance, I marched right back to Kroger and exchanged it for a different brand. While I
was there exchanging it, I could actually smell the stench rising from the Butternut shelf—which I didn’t notice
earlier. It was so bad that I gagged and almost vomited.
Later, I e-mailed Kroger about this, and they got back to me saying they’re not responsible for the quality
of the brands they carry. They didn’t even seem willing to investigate the possibility that something in their store
might have been making the bread spoil. They were passing the buck.
Guess what? Kroger actually got it right. The whole thing is Butternut’s fault. I found numerous
complaints online about Butternut changing their product in the past few weeks, making it inedible. These
complaints came from customers of other stores—not just Kroger—and from other cities.
You’re busted, Butternut.
Nabisco is busted too. They ought to be called Nabusted! Shortly after George W. Bush seized power,
Nabisco ruined its line of crackers that included Sociables. After all, when does any consumer product ever
improve?
Na-bus-ted! Ding!

An art pen! Wow!

You know who once ate breakfast cereal? A certain woman who
critiques each edition of this zine, that’s who. She says she doesn’t
touch the stuff nowadays, but she’s obsessed with cereal, and wants me
to talk about it.
I swore off cereal during the cereal industry’s price-gouging
scandal of the ‘90s—when I no longer liked cereal anyway. But cereal
is associated with my generation. In my day, it was probably much more
widely consumed and advertised. I have many fond memories inspired
by cereal advertising.
Cheerios liked to tout itself as part of a nutritious breakfast full
of enough vitamins to give you energy to last the day. I know it was no
match for a day of Brossart, but who can forget the TV commercials?
Inevitably, the lines “We make Cheerios low in sugar...Kids make
Cheerios #1” were parodied to become “We make Cheerios low in
boogers...Kids make Cheerios Number Two.” Get it? Number Two!
That ad campaign mostly came after the famous
“Cheerioioios!” ads. These commercials always featured a cartoon of a youngster opening a box of this cereal,
and the box would yodel, “Cheerioioios!” It sounded a bit like the Ricola commersh of the ‘90s. The animation
consisted of white lines on a black background—like a chalkboard.
When I was 10 or 11, this stirring chant inspired some neighborhood hijinks. I hung out with a classmate
who lived up the block—who had burned a couch in the woods. One afternoon, we stood near the top of the street
and yodeled at the top of our lungs, “Cheerioioios!” We wanted to hear it echo off the hills. The neighbors were
furious!
My business partner who reviews this zine is still waiting on the edge of her seat to find a 1987 commersh
for an unspecified brand of cereal with a free bubble gum offer. I regaled you of her desperate quest in our May
issue. The ‘80s were the decade of bubble gum being included as a prize in cereal boxes. Cocoa Puffs and the line
of monster cereals that included Count Chocula seemed to be the likeliest sources, and Super Bubble seemed to be
the most common brand of beegee they included.
 I remember many commercials for cereal with a bubble gum offer going something like this: The first 15
or 20 seconds of the 30-second spot would be about the cereal itself. The rest of the ad would promote the gum—
often with the cereal mascot’s voice talking over it. It often included a clip of 2 kids—one of them blowing a huge
bubble, and the other gazing at them, exclaiming, “Wow!” However, the 1987 ad being sought reportedly differed
in that the gum portion featured only one person.
Bubble gum wasn’t the only cereal prize that elicited such exaggerated excitement. Remember this
classic?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGNKRqBn0q4

That ad appears to bear a blurry copyright date of 1982 and advertises Cookie Crisp cereal. Cookie Crisp
included an art pen as a prize. “An art pen! Wow!” the kid in the ad declares, as if he’s just defeated capitalism or
something. For decades, I thought it was Frosted Flakes that had the art pen. But Frosted Flakes had something
even better: the Diving Tony!
Among the worst prizes were those that could not be redeemed. Researching for this article, I found some
cereals that included coupons for brands of bubble gum I’ve never seen anywhere.
Aye aye, Count!

How to get a gentrificationazi to lose their shit

Supporters of gentrification are some of the biggest right-wing hypocrites you can ever hope to meet, and
there’s one aspect of their wicked agenda where if you challenge it, they’ll go bananas.
If you want to make them mad—I mean really, really, really mad—you should say that the sheriff should
stop enforcing foreclosures.
They have no counterargument, and they can’t cope. That’s because the foreclosure pandemic exposes
their hypocrisy. Gentrification artificially jacks up housing prices—but its supporters won’t fight against
foreclosures, even though foreclosures devalue nearby properties that people already own. The gentrification
thought police supports higher property values only when it suits themselves. I think they support foreclosures so
they can buy the devalued properties cheaply and then sell them or rent them out at a much higher price. In fact, I
don’t just think that’s why. I know that’s why.
It’s babyish really.
They’re chomping at the bit to use their favorite argument: comparing their opponents’ stance to welfare.
They want in the worst way to claim that not enforcing foreclosures is a form of welfare. Remember, we’re
talking about people who said Obamacare is welfare. (OpenOffice finally knows the word Obamacare. Yay!)
They think SSI and Medicaid are welfare. They haven’t come right out and said that a halt to foreclosures is
welfare, but they’ve kind of sputtered around it. They don’t want to say it directly, because they know it’ll make
themselves look stupid—though they’ve done a mighty good job of that already.
NKU intentionally devalues property too. They buy houses and neglect or demolish them, which devalues
nearby properties so they can buy those for less. I’m sure big corporations do it too.
Corporations are not people, but people who cheer gentrification are corporations.

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